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Training Progressions at South Sound
Titans Swim Team
Skill Progressions & Seasonal
Progressions
South Sound Titans Swim Team training progressions work on two
tracks. The first
track is called Skill Progressions. Although all competitive swimmers
learn skills throughout their career, this track primarily affects
new and younger swimmers. This track methodically builds
technical and mental skills athletes need to acquire as they
advance into training regimens with increased physical
demands. The second
track is Seasonal Progressions. It primarily affects veteran and
physically mature swimmers through demanding physical conditioning
regimens that progressively intensify over the course of a season,
a training cycle or across multiple training cycles and
seasons.
Psychological Maturation & Physical
Maturation
Two sets of forces direct how the various elements in our training
program are distributed over the training groups and how they are
integrated. The first
set of forces is swimmer growth in two areas: physical maturation
and psychological maturation. The second set of forces is
swimmer performance in two areas: biomechanics (technique) and
training volume (physical conditioning). There is a great deal of
interplay between both sets of forces and balancing the mix as
athletes improve and mature is the primary responsibility of any
swim team's coaching staff.
Balancing Training Progressions In Prepubescent
Athletes
At South Sound Titans Swim Team we place little importance on
training volume for the prepubescent athlete. Generally, prepubescent athletes
fail to respond to manipulation of training volume in an effort to
stimulate specific physiological responses. In other words, despite the fact
that a young swimmer may be motivated to complete rigorous training
bouts and capable of enduring them as well, there is probably
little additional benefit to taking that
course.
Research suggests that, regardless of the athlete’s perceived
effort and actual volume, prepubescent bodies respond to training
almost entirely aerobically, the same way they respond to lower
training volumes.
Therefore, accelerated training will most likely realize little
genuine improvement in physical condition and competition.
When administered correctly, practices designed for young swimmers
by a professional swim coach that emphasize technique will prove
just as beneficial for improving fitness as swimming thousands of
yards. This is one
reason prepubescent athletes are best served by the acquisition and
refinement of biomechanical skills, as emphasized in the Guppies,
Beginner, and Mid-Level training groups. Physical conditioning is
necessarily served by repetition of skill building drills at
practice.
In addition to the young body’s lack of response to high
volume training, in all swimmers there is a rapid deterioration of
biomechanical efficiency with the onset of fatigue. As a swimmer tires during
training their technique fails. They spend so much energy
responding to the physical demands of a rigorous training bout that
little thought or effort can be directed at technique and rule
related skills.
Younger, pre-pubescent swimmers naturally have smaller energy
reserves and fatigue faster with higher demands. Since the Titans value technique
over volume for the prepubescent athlete, young swimmers in our
program can direct their effort at acquiring good technique while
improving their physical condition.
Among prepubescent athletes one must also consider the long-term
psychological implications of demanding higher training volumes
from developing athletes. While one can debate the impact
ad nauseam, the few tracking studies that have been conducted
indicate that swimmers introduced to heavy training volumes early
in their careers tend to quit competitive swimming before reaching
college age. Of
course, this does not mean that they would not have quit
anyway. But, casual
interviews with some of these athletes indicate that the increased
volume at an early age affected the way they viewed competitive
swimming and, therefore, influenced their decision to discontinue
the sport.
Balancing Training Progressions in Physically Mature
Athletes
As previously implied, physically mature athletes are contrasted
with the prepubescent group in the way their bodies adapt to
training volume.
Balancing training to stimulate specific biochemical and
physiological responses at the cellular level is critical to their
success. Perhaps more
importantly for this group of swimmers, puberty brings with it some
early indications of the aging process.
The acquisition of fine motor skills, the establishment of
efficient neuromuscular response patterns, and the ability to
correct biomechanical errors grows increasingly difficult as
athletes reach physical maturity. Simply put, it's far easier to
establish correct technique in the prepubescent athlete than in
athletes aging into their teens. As they grow older their bodies
are better suited to endure rigorous training bouts intended to
manipulate metabolic responses and less responsive to attempts to
correct errors or change inefficient biomechanical patterns
established in their youth.
Valuing Technique, Efficiency, and
Volume
Perhaps the most important consideration when
valuing biomechanics and training volume is the fact that better
conditioned athletes do not outperform athletes with greater
technical expertise.
One of the primary influences on South Sound Titans Head Coach
Shawn Jones is Dr. Leo D’Acquisto,
a professor of exercise physiology at Central Washington University
that conducted extensive research at the Human Performance Lab at
Ball State University with Dr. David Costill.
Dr. D’Acquisto demonstrated in several studies that
competitive swimmers with biomechanical superiority will
outperform
similarly trained
but less mechanically efficient competitive
swimmers that are in better physical
condition as measured by their VO
2
max
(one’s ability to absorb oxygen - a
widely accepted indicator of general fitness).
Competitive swimmers whose VO
2
max
is up to 25% superior to teammates with
lower VO
2
max
have been shown to
always be inferior
in competition to less fit but technically superior competitive
swimmers. Although
volume plays a role, it appears that, in well-conditioned swimmers,
efficiency is more important than volume.
As mentioned earlier, mature bodies respond
with difficulty to technical modifications and young bodies respond
minimally to metabolic manipulation. Consequently, it is logical to
spend a great deal of time emphasizing correct technique to
young swimmers.
Training Group
Advancements
In the Titans system, swimmers improve their
chances for success by being built one step at a time rather than
undergo drills for randomly selected skills based on casual
observations at meets and practice. Each step needs to compliment the
previous step while simultaneously preparing them for the next
step. Integrating
technique skills as swimmers grow and improve ensures no important
skills are overlooked as they age and
mature and prepare to undertake heavy training bouts later in their
careers. Learning
skills is good.
Learning them in a methodical way is better. The Titans Team equips
competitive swimmers with sets of skills that are distributed over
the swimmer’s entire career based on age, maturation and
acquisition of prerequisite skills. This is
best.
Advancement through the Titans system is methodical and
our coaches are conservative in their evaluations of swimmer
preparedness to advance. The degree of mastery required to advance varies for each skill or
set of skills and advancement to a new training group is at the
sole discretion of our coaches.
Conclusion
All the factors mentioned in this
outline are the primary driving forces behind The Titans Way Our
training philosophy emphasizes coaching swimmers to achieve
sustained success over the long term by valuing biomechanical
efficiency over training volume and refusing to accelerate a
talented age group swimmer in the interest of achieving accolades
in the short term.
Other elements like teamwork, leadership and time management are
naturally occurring by-products of this system.
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